Ohio Linux Fest - October 10th and 11th, 2008: Columbus, Ohio

Paw Prints: Writings of the maddog

Sep 15, 2008 GMT

Jon maddog Hall

On October 10th and 11th, 2008 the Ohio Linux Fest (OLF) 2008 Ohio Linux Fest (OLF) 2008 will occur. This is the sixth edition of this event, held every year in Columbus Ohio. I like OLF, because it is not only a community event, staged and run by volunteers, but it is also a family event, with people of all ages invited and involved.

When I say "all ages", one of the speakers is Elizabeth Garbee, a teenager who will be talking about Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) from a teenage perspective. If her last name sounds familiar, she shares it with her father Bdale Garbee, who is the Chief Technologist for Open Source and Linux at Hewlett Packard and former Debian project leader. Bdale will be talking about "Peace, Love and Rockets", how he uses FOSS in his amateur and not-so-amateur rocket work. I saw this talk at DebConf 8 in Argentina, and the talk was very good, albeit a little explosive.

The keynotes this year ("maddog, you can't be the keynote every year!...") will be Joe Brockmeier, OpenSUSE community manager and Jono Bacon, Ubuntu Community Manager. I wonder if there will be a fight to the death among the community managers? Perhaps not, but I have heard both of these people speak, and their talks should be interesting even if there is no real blood spilled.

Speaking of spilling blood, Peter Salus, my old time friend and mentor will also be speaking. Peter, who no one has ever accused of being a shrinking violet, is generally considered to be the historian and curmudgeon of Unix systems. Peter is extending himself to do the same tasks with Free and Open Source.

Additionally I will be there, giving a talk on "Sustainable Computing"

The complete list of speakers and topics shows a wide range of topics. There will be topics of interest to beginners and experts. Those attendees who are expert in one area may be a beginner in others, so there is something for everyone.

The only "problem" I had last year was due to the event having three tracks and only one day. Several times in the day I found there were often two things I wanted to attend, and I had to make a choice. On the other hand, it was better than being bored, which never happened.

Finally, the part that I never had to think about choice was for the reception on Friday night and the "after party" on Saturday night. Both parties are accessible by everybody, although the "supporters" and the "professionals" get a complimentary drink at each event.

Like a lot of community events, the registration is free for "enthusiasts", but they kindly ask a "supporter" fee of $65 (which includes a T-shirt and lunch on Saturday), and a "professional" package which includes everything the supporter package does plus the day of tutorials from LOPSA. Note that these tutorials are taught the previous day, October 10th, while the free sessions are on Saturday, October 11th, 2008